Note: This is a seattlepi.com reader blog. It is not written or edited by the P-I. The authors are solely responsible for content. E-mail us at newmedia@seattlepi.com if you consider a post inappropriate.

In the Hall of the Mountain Riders – Tevis prequel

“Whoosh, Rrr Rrr Rrrr, Vvvvvvvroom” – the individual sounds on the freeway were already blending into a wall of noise at 6:30 a.m.

Each one of those vehicles is on a mission, I thought to myself, as Cathy was not awake yet. Timber, tomatoes and contraband flow ceaselessly along the I-5 corridor day and night. But we are not consumed with the petty obsessions of commerce. We are on an adventure! Cathy would have brought me down to earth.

Morning fog at the campground

It was Tuesday morning, and the Teke Caravan was parked just of the highway at Rogue River Valley State Park, en route to the fairgrounds in Auburn for the Tevis Cup,a ritual that has been enacted annually since 1955 (with only one exception – the ride was cancelled in 2008 because of smoke from forest fires). As I pointed my camera at the sky, I had few anxieties about the ride. After all, I wasn’t the one who had to go one hundred miles. I was just there as a supporter and auxillary crew.

Shortly after I took the picture, the clouds closed in and a light drizzle began. I checked the latest weather forecasts. Although snow was predicted for Wednesday, at the higher altitudes, locals posting on the Yahoo group for Tevis information suggested that it would not be more than a few inches at Robie Park, location of the vet-in and ride start.

By mid-morning, we were in Weed, where the rest stop sign showed a sunnier view. A few miles down the road, my phone rang. “I heard they are going to cancel Tevis!” a friend said.

“No way.” I responded.

No way, because we are halfway there. No way, because Jas came all the way from Colorado for the ride of a lifetime. No way, because too many people are wishing success for her and her horse, Patrickhan.

I quoted the local reports about snowfall from the chatlist, but the fear was now ricocheting around my head. Cancellation would be a dismal outcome indeed. Unlikely, too. With so many riders already gathered, with international participants and major sponsors, there would be considerable pressure to pull off the ride somehow. I tried to shake it off the thought, repeating Cathy’s saying — “It’s all about the attitude.”

We continued down I-5 without any further mention of the snow. Outside Sacramento, the sky began to look ominous. “Seattle weather,” we joked uneasily.

Soon the rain was sluicing down. We watched the fountains jetting ten feet in the air from the uncovered wheels of a trailerless semi. “Good demonstration of why tire have treads,” I commented.

“And why we have wheel wells,” added Cathy.

The phone rang. It was Steve Hallmark, who was prepared to host the Teke caravan at his home in Loomis. We knew he had other things to worry about, since he was planning to ride his gelding, Tug, on Saturday. Jas had told us the night before that they were saving a spot for us at the fairgrounds. So we said we thought we were okay, but we would be in touch.

“is this normal October weather round here?” Cathy asked.

“Not at all,” Steve said. He currently lives in Loomis with his wife Pat, though they once were Pacific Northwesters.

Normal is a dangerous word, anyway. There had been nothing normal about the 2011 edition of the Tevis Cup so far. The ride was already rescheduled from July to October because of excess snowpack (over 150% of normal) in the Sierra Nevadas. The high elevation of Robie Park and the trail’s climb up to Squaw Valley and Emigrant Pass meant that trail maintenance was not possible and conditions were likely to be hazardous for the normal late July/early August Tevis date. The fairgrounds, an important component of the ride, were booked with events through the summer, and so a date in October was found. Though a gun show and an Octoberfest were scheduled concurrently, they would not be using the arena or the stalls, and the moon would be nearly full that weekend. So October 8th was chosen by the Tevis committee. A banner was designed showing a horse with snowshoes. It was not intended to be prophetic.

It was merely drizzling and grey when we arrived at the fairgrounds. Jas met us and showed us our spot across the road from their long row of trailers. The Kenlyn gang had been in residence since Sunday to help the horses acclimate and to pre-ride the trail.

The best thing we could say about it was that it was level. Tucked into a corner by a maintenance building, it was quickly dubbed “the hobo camp.” Trains went by a hundred yards away, and piles of miscellaneous stuff, including an old toilet, flanked the Teke Caravan. I noticed some writing on the boards leaning up against one pile and saw a half-smudged name I recognized “Ford, Garrett,” along with other names that were by now familiar, Robinson Flats, Deadwood, Michigan Bluffs. They were last year’s leaderboards, I think.

Patrick was resting in his stall in barn number 3, the pig barn for the State Fair. He was at the end of the row, next to a bay gelding called Challenger. Two days of traveling together had established them as compatible.

“Compatible” means that Challenger accepted Patrick’s chastising nips without complaint. Patrick is used to living with his mares, even now that he is a gelding. He doesn’t watch buddy movies or indulge in male bonding rituals, so having a friend was new to him.

He is more at ease with hums, though he isn’t inclined to relax with strangers. Fortunately we were at least acquainted already.

“We didn’t ride today because it was muddy and slippery, but we got out for a long walk,” Jas said. Patrick seemed pretty relaxed. So did Jas. If she had pre-ride jitters, she wasn’t confessing.

Once Patrick had his mash in front of him, we returned to the trailers, and Jas introduced us to some of her fellow riders from Northern Colorado and Wyoming. Bob and Carol, Jane, Herb and Lynn were there, along with Diana and Terry, along to crew. Then there was Charlie, Lynn’s husband, who was busy with their daughter, Cheyenne.

“Come to dinner. We have to clear out the freezer to make room for the ice boots,” Carol said.

We had originally planned to attend the barbeque that was already underway in the Pavilion, but the damp chill evening made standing on concrete a less than appealing proposition. So we gladly accepted the invitation and found spots in the trailer. Over chips and beer, we got a little bit acquainted.

Though we were there to support Jas, it made most sense to join forces with the Kenlyn team, who had done this ride many times before.

Part of the group were missing, including Linda Fisher, owner of Kenlyn Arabians. They were still out on a scouting mission to Robie Park. So we settled into the warm mobile home for the first part of our progressive dinner. Dessert was to be in Lynn and Charlie’s home on wheels.

By the time Linda and her son Brian got there, the lasagna was bubbling. They reported that there were only a couple of vendors and another mountain region rider, Crockett, up at Robie Park with two horses. One of the vendors had tried to get out and gotten stuck on the slippery roads. Brian’s phone showed us a winter wonderland – great if you had plans to ski Squaw Valley at Christmas but not so welcome now.

Alice Chapman, our third Washington crew member, was in Reno, where she had flown in. She had reserved a car and was planning to drive over the next day, although I-80 was currently closed at the pass. It was inevitable – the Donner Party was mentioned.

Jane's dessert creation, complete with fresh mint leaves

Once fortified by ample food, the riders began to discuss the anticipated conditions. The snow itself didn’t scare them. That was something they were used to.

“The front-runners will be breaking trail for us, after all….” “Maybe the snow will make the start brighter than usual….” some people found encouragement in the anticipated conditions. Others were rather quiet on the subject. I quoted the latest weather report off my phone. It still said clearing on Thursday, sunshine Friday and Saturday, ride day was to be a perfect seventy degrees.

Then the Kenlyn pre-ride meeting began, complete with a sheet of target times for arriving at each vet check, gate-and-go or trot-through, prepared by Jane. The Kenlyn gang were “riding for the buckle,” aiming for completion rather than racing for a spot in the top ten. Still, they wanted to use the time wisely and be well clear of the cut-off times at the later vet checks. Jane had adjusted her spreadsheet to accommodate the earlier cut-offs mandated by the longer hours of darkness. The riders had their own small laminated versions. The combined experience and organization of the team put us Tevis newbies at ease. We had a clear plan to follow. I glanced at Jas. She looked relaxed too.

The discussion turned to getting the trailers and horses up to the start point. The original plan – to caravan up to Robie Park the next day – was scrapped.

Well, I reflected maybe the conditions would make for some more good stories, if a jacknifed trailer didn’t block the road for everyone else. The mountain riders had plenty more tales of woe to entertain us through second dessert, until Diana, the crew captain this year, was egged on to sing.

“The Easyboot Song!” the call went up. Diana sat up a bit straighter and rendered her original lyrics acapella, to the tune of Leader of the Pack:

I’ve been so busy… the week from h**l
Had a hair appointment and a shoeing as well.
Don’t you know, it’s just so hard to choose
And I can get one more ride out of six week-old shoes.

I am dreaming of being LEADER OF THE PACK

Camper crowd: Vroom, Vroom

It was a big ride, my horse fit to go
I had no intentions of doing it slow.
At the start line I was loaded with bear
Water bottle, map and a boot tied there.

I am planning on being LEADER OF THE PACK

Camper crowd: Vroom, Vroom

At twenty-five I heard that loud ping
From his rear hoof my horse his shoe he did fling.
Well I slapped that orange easy boot on
I fed that boy a carrot, then I was long gone.

Smugly I am still – LEADER OF THE PACK

Camper crowd: Vroom, Vroom (laughter)

At thirty-five I heard that awful pop
‘Scuse me, do you have a spare double-ought?
Two riders passed before a spare could be found
I didn’t dare go on – I was on rocky ground

My hopes are fading – LEADER OF THE PACK

Camper crowd: Vroom, Vroom (more laughter)

At forty-five I saw that shoe fly
Over the cliff, no time for goodbye
The riders passed me one by two
But I just walked on in – got one last loose shoe

I wonder who finished – LEADER OF THE PACK

I crossed the finish line in disgrace
My hair looked bad and I was in last place.
Don’t you know I wrote that shoer a note,
I’ll never miss another, that is what I wrote.

Without you I can’t be – LEADER OF THE PACK

Camper crowd: Vroom, Vroom ( laughter and extensive applause)

“I’ve never heard that one before,” someone commented.

“That was due to Linda.” Diana explained, “Most of them are due to Linda!”

“It’s all true,’ said Linda. “It was my own ride, too!”

Linda is not only a breeder of endurance horses, she is a ride manager and a fierce competitor who spurs others on beyond their imagined limits.

This Tevis was especially important to Linda for a number of reasons. She has a perfect completion record at Tevis, and even the riders she has brought have always completed, she told me later. It was one of her crew who mentioned that this was to be her last time to ride herself, as she was focusing more and more on doing shorter distances with her grandchildren.

The energy was still flowing in the camper, but Cathy and I were feeling the effects of two days on the road and it was time to go to bed.

Jas came to stay with us in the Hobo Camp that night, bringing her jar of Sumatran coffee as a dowry. We slept well – I never heard a single one of the trains going by.

Note: This is a seattlepi.com reader blog. It is not written or edited by the P-I. The authors are solely responsible for content. E-mail us at newmedia@seattlepi.com if you consider a post inappropriate.